Inexpensive Christmas Party Table Centerpieces

Sometimes I daydream about how I would decorate my home and for parties if money wasn't an issue and there was no budget involved.  However, that is never the case.  I was in charge of decorating for a church Christmas party.  We had less than 50 dollars to spend on decorating tables for 200 people.  With little money and lots of table centerpieces needed, we had to be creative.  Many of the supplies we used for the centerpieces were reused items.
We put wrapping paper squares on top of the table clothes to add more color and variety to the tables.  Half the tables had wrapped presents and the other half had Santa cans with evergreens and berries.

1.  Presents:
     Wrap empty boxes with pretty paper and tie ribbon around them.  This looks great and is very expensive when you have to decorate a ton of tables.

2. Evergreen Santa Cans:

    I got emptied number 10 cans (large metal cans that contain food) from an elementary school kitchen.  I spray painted them red.  It took 2 coats of paint.  Then I cut a long strip of black felt for Santa's belt and attached it with glue to the can.  Next, I cut out a gray square with an empty square in the middle for the belt buckle.  I glued the buckle on top of the Santa's belt.  That's all to make the can.  For the greenery, I used the extra pieces from our Christmas tree that we cut down.  We still didn't have enough greenery for all the tables, so we went up to the mountains and collected some more evergreen branches.  I bought the berries from Michaels craft store.  

 What do you do with all the centerpieces when it's done?

       I took all of the wrapped presents to the elementary school I taught at.  They put them under their huge tree which is used for kids to throw gloves and scarves on that they are donating to people in need.

I emptied the Santa cans and used the cans to put gifts in.